The forests turned into a proper swamp as Alana led them deeper into the wilds. The visual was stunning in many ways, the lightning element was so thick in this area that it defined the flora and fauna, the edges of leaves had a soft glow and all insects shone like fireflies. But that was also dangerous, with electrified thorny bushes and speed-boosted mosquitoes, not to count the other type of potentially dangerous life that lived in places as wet as this, like armoured fishes with rock-crushing bites or giant frogs.

Their luck came in the fact they were going towards a facility of some sort, and soon they had metallic pipes to guide them and even offer footing in tricky areas.

As they drew nearer their destination, the unmistakable roar of a colossal waterfall - the storm drain's outlet - filled their ears. It didn't take long before they saw a structure of white concrete past the treeline, a metallic walkway offering an easy path upward.

The panorama at the top was amazing, most of the water cascaded into a massive lake, while some was diverted through orichalcum pipes to further nourish the sprawling swamps and rainforests that stretched to the horizon.

Qullqi couldn’t help but recall how merely a few decades ago this entire zone was an ecological disaster. The island had quickly urbanized and messed up the waterways and the flow of energy, on top of that, the system of drainage and sewage were mixed together leading to more pollution.

Her thoughts were abruptly cut short by the sound of screeching metal. Qullqi quickly turned back to see Maze forcibly prying open the facility's door.

"Do you not know how to pick locks?" Qullqi asked, hurrying to Maze's side.

“Grhrk, no, more of a brute force gal.” the werewolf answered with a shameless smile.

Maze pressed her feet against the wall and once again her eyes gained a shine, going from coppery orange to a bright yellow. Her hair, which had started the day short, grew each time she used such ability, now reaching past her shoulder. Qull didn’t want to stare, but she couldn't help but notice the body hair creeping along Maze's limbs.

With a resounding crack, the door flew off its hinges and crashed to the ground. Alana squeaked and jumped back, and the deafening noise sent nearby birds, many of them bioluminescent, fleeing into the sky. Despite the captivating sight, Qullqi noticed something odd and concerning in that cacophony of noises.

“Are there native crow species in Lullaby?” the merc asked her friends.

Maze shrugged. “You’d be the one to know this type of random trivia. Why do you ask?”

"I heard a lot of cawing when the birds took flight, thanks to your subtle entrance."

Maze nodded, understanding the issue. “Yeah, high chance that is trouble. We should rush inside already, it's a long walk back to the city.”

----------------------------------------

Unlike what Alana’s description of it as a “sewer” would imply, the walk into the drainage system was, at least initially, safe and pleasant. The water channel was far below them, flanked by wide concrete barriers. The structure seemed to alternate between making use of natural caves and artificial tunnels.

The flow of water grew stronger as they moved upstream, with many of the split paths converging. Too often, they would need to walk over the rushing water, thankfully there were always metallic, orichalcum-coated bridges connecting each side.

“Should we kick down this bridge?” Maze hummed.

“That would make it very obvious what path we took,” Qull warned.

“I don’t think we should be, uhm, committing so much vandalism.” Alana sighed.

As they got closer to the city, the building styles of the man-made parts of the path started to become older. Qullqi had expected to see structures from the 70s or even the 40s, but soon enough she was encountering structures that were centenary.

It quickly made sense in her head, the stormwater flow of the caves had been tamed by engineering, but it also had signs of originally being a much older, natural phenomenon. Given how this land's culture connected to their storms, this area seems like the type that would have cultural or religious significance. This was further confirmed as they entered an area that looked like a temple, with images of the local creatures, of kings, and of the ocean dragons in archaic murals, all quite faded and reclaimed by nature.

Also, images of monkeys. A mythical creature said to look human-like in shape, but not merely similiforme like so many more ethereal entities, instead, they were said to be entirely biological and 'mundane' in nature. Most such things Qull would dismiss as fairytales, but every culture in the world had its own version of these fantastical creatures, her homeland has tales of little forest monkeys howling in the trees with manes in yellow and white, Numidia had tales of the Gorilla, muscular hairy hominids who walked on all four, and of course, Wenming had the tale of the Monkey King.

Qull was on the precipice of terminal brooding as she started thinking of Carlin Darwin's theory of the primate design, which went against the commonly held dogma that the species evolved through spontaneous mutation over time.

“Oh, these slugs seem useful.” Alana’s dog ears shot up as she noticed some of the little creatures that were all over one side of the walls. Qullqi immediately snapped back to reality and tried to keep a respectful distance, stepping as far away as she could.

She failed, Alana innocently picked one of the creatures with a cloth and rushed to show the merc it. “Can you identify it?”

“Ah! Keep this thing away.” Qullqi barked before she could think, jumping backwards and closing her eyes. The thing was just so disgusting, with its horn, slimy body and oozing secretion, the way it moved by wobbling and flowing around, it was all too much.

Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

“Ah, sorry, didn’t know you feared these little guys” Somehow Alana’s words tilted Qullqi more than Maze chortling at the sight.

“Ahem.” The merc cleared her throat trying to recover some face. “It would be criminal to gather them and move them to another country, but we are already smuggling, so I don’t see why not.”

The witch nodded. “They seem infused with a lighting element and also, hmm, an aspect of the sky? I can’t tell too well, but their presence could help some of my medicinal plants to grow. Oh, and they could make for a good potion ingredient too.”

The desire to vomit forced Qull’s hand to her mouth, and then people asked why she always defaulted to synthesized medicine over ‘traditional’ brews.

As they continued, the path became more maze-like, with the way ahead not always so clear, as abandoned structures and natural caves intertwined with the new massive water channel, often requiring the group to brave over ancient stone stairs and bridges or walk into natural underground habitats, these even more bioluminescent than the overland biomes.

“Boring, if this was an adventure game there would be big animals all over this place, trying to make dinner out of us.” Maze sighed, poking at a small crab that was walking over a mossy rock, the little fella trying to daze the werewolf by creating flashes of light each time it pinched its claws.

“You will end up jinxing us.” Alana poked the werewolf with her wooden stick, pouting.

No giant creature attacked them, but something concerning did appear as they got deeper into the cave. Human bones.

“Ah, what the hell.” Maze eeped as she stumbled upon it, Qullqi and Alana had a more composed reaction, both looking at it with curiosity.

“Oh! Mystery skeleton! It really is like an adventure novel! I wonder how long this has been left here?” the witch asked, eerily excited about the topic.

“Centuries probably??” Maze added, avoiding direct eye contact with the human remains.

But that could not be right. Qull’s eyes darted around as she gathered clues.

The cave was humid and mossy, brimming with life, yet the skeleton was perfectly clean, it almost looked like a prop. There were signs of some sort of dental care on its mouth, and it was modern dental care. Without thinking, she leaned forward and started patting the cranium.

“WHAT THE!? CHIRIBAYA DO NOT TOUCH IT.” Maze barked at Qull’s ear, but the merc ignored her.

It was smooth, too smooth, with a plastic-like feeling to the touch, but it was a real skeleton, not a prop.

“This must have happened recently, maybe even less than a week ago. Something quickly digested all the tissues but could not deal with the bones. No bite marks, no clawing marks, no hints of blunt force.” the chimera said in a low tone.

“Sounds like the work of a slime creature.” Alana mused.

“That is their perception in movies and shows, but slimes mostly live by absorbing micro-organisms and dead plants. Weak lesser creatures, not proper animals, no core either, no different from dust bunnies and wisps.” The chimera tilted her head. “Yet everything points towards that. Peculiar.”

“Uh. ground control to the land of lunatics, are you two insane? We discovered there is a dangerous monster here, and you two are playing detective? By the saints, let’s go already! As if the Tengu on my tail was not enough.” Maze huffed.

The werewolf had a point. The effects of being broken out of the system still lingered, and in Qullqi’s case, she was finding that when in the context of a small adventurer group, she was far more likely to burn through her specialized ammunition. She had used two out of five etched bullets she had purchased in a single day.

“We will file this discovery at the adventurer’s office later, let the local authorities solve this,” Qull said, standing up, looking at her surroundings with far more care.

----------------------------------------

Their original journey plan ended abruptly as they reached yet another artificial waterfall, in this case however, it was not merely a reservoir and output system, like it was outside, but a fully functional hydraulic dam.

Qullqi had been expecting to see one of these. Typical river water produces force, but the elemental charges are all over the place, not to count the effect of rot and other impurities. Rainwater is to it like glass is to sand, it's refined, and it produces electricity in higher quantities and in grades of quality above what any other energy source can provide.

Lullaby Island’s ability to produce electricity in such rare high quality had made it a powerhouse of the thaumaturgic and alchemical industries in only a few decades.

“Loooots of warding over there.” Alana noticed with her more mystically attuned senses, Qullqi couldn’t see that, but she could see the multi-layered gates ahead. This made it impossible to continue simply following the channel upward.

“Uhhh, Qullqi, since you are the smart one...” Maze started.

“I am not that smart. I just know what your average high school graduate would know.”

“Alana and I are high school dropouts so that still makes you the smartest.” Mazeline huffed. “Anyway, ideas on how to bypass this? Do you think you and Alana could work on taking off wards and lockpicking?”

“Not really, and don’t forget the chance the Tengu's agents are aware we are taking this route." They had avoided the service corridors and taken the cavernous paths, but Qullqi still didn't feel safe in the long term. "We don’t have time to open the locks.”

“Hold on a second.” Alana declared, waving her wooden staff, a gentle breeze dancing around them and then expanding.

“Oh! You can use that wind spell to scout forward too? Nice!” Maze hummed happily, wagging her tail as she could probably follow it with her own attuned senses.

“You really should make a list of the spells you have Alana. It would help us as a group.” Qullqi pondered, not being to see the spell work as well as the other two could.

“Absolutely! I was already planning on asking the same once we got officially contracted by our sponsor.” Maze added. “Things have been a bit more hectic than I expected...”

“Because a silly wolf just needed to battle us to prove a point.” Qull pouted.

“It was a good point! And it was a fun battle too!”

“Easy to say that when you don’t have to pay for each shot you take...”

“Why don’t you use a self-charging blaster? I know they are low damage, but they will be more cost-effective, no?”

“The self-charging of such weapons happens by using your own etheric energies to fill it. But I have none. I am...”

“Yeah, I know that Qull. But like, there is me, and there is Alana, right? We could charge the gun for you.”

Qull turned to stare at Maze, not her typical cold glance, but instead... a blushing one. She covered her mouth with her poncho and turned to the side to hide a soft blush. “Oh... Oh yeah.”

“Pff hahaha. Lone wolf syndrome I guess?” Maze chortled.

“Quiet.” Qull snapped.

“Goodness, I never had to cast a spell with so many people talking around me. It’s a bit stressful” Alana said in a nervous voice, clearly wanting to tell them both to shut up. “Oh. I found it. If we climb up that ruined bridge, we can move up a corridor and reach the upper area.”

“I can climb that. Qull, you have a rope, right? Give it to me, I will hold it once I am up there, to help you two get up.” Maze eagerly proposed.

Qull nodded and while she saw her werewolf comrade get up the walls, she couldn’t help but think a bit about how this felt so different from her time in the mercenary band. Teamwork without rigid order was... pleasant. There was a sense of belonging, but it was not simply following the plan of your superiors or performing well given the directive of the operation.

The feeling was not camaraderie, the army had that too, everyone was friends in a strange way, especially since they only dealt with non-fatal combat and disaster relief. So what was this feeling she felt with Cerberus?

"Eh." Qull shrugged. Probably only the natural joy of trying something new and adventurous. Given time, it would fade in face of the harsher realities, like everything else.